BRUNSWICK — In one play, Lawrence’s pass-and-catch combination of Cody Martin and Dustin Simpson-Bragg stretched Brunswick’s defense like few teams in the Pine Tree Conference had this season.

After Martin’s 75-yard touchdown pass to Simpson-Bragg pulled the Bulldogs to within 14-13 late in the first quarter, it would have been a stretch to assume the Eastern Class B final was headed anywhere but a shootout.

Brunswick’s offense continued firing throughout the first half. Brunswick’s defense made sure the Bulldogs shot blanks, and completed a dominating 48-19 win.

“I think they’ve been doing that pretty much all season with their defense, the way they attack the line of scrimmage and make it tough for you to get going,” Lawrence coach John Hersom said. “They covered our receivers pretty well and gave very little time for our quarterback to look for his receivers down the field.”

Lawrence found itself in second-and-long and third-and-long situations all night thanks to a smothering Brunswick run defense.

“We’ve had some issues with our linemen all year, but we played hard up front all game and we controlled the line scrimmage. That makes a huge difference,” senior defensive end Alex Bandouveres said.

“They really couldn’t run the ball tonight. They were forced to throw the ball,” Brunswick coach Dan Cooper said. “We got pressure on (Martin). He made some bad throws. They dropped the ball. They just didn’t make the plays when they needed to, which allowed this thing to snowball in our favor.”

While the Brunswick offense, led by running backs Will Bessey and Bandouveres, ran through Lawrence like snowballs rolling downhill, the defense kept pushing the Bulldogs’ offense back — almost to the snow banks in the end zone.

Aside from a circus catch by Simpson-Bragg for 15 yards late in the first half, the Bulldogs didn’t get another first down until midway through the fourth quarter when the game was well out of hand.

“I watched them play last week, and they made every play they needed to,” Cooper said. “But it just didn’t go their way tonight.”

Lawrence totaled just 48 yards of offense in the first half. Most of those came on its first play from scrimmage, a 32-yard run by Cole Robinson.

“All week we said we had to control our gaps and play our roles. That’s what we did and it got the job done,” Bandouveres said.

Randy Whitehouse — 621-5638

rwhitehouse@mainetoday.com

Twitter: @RAWmaterial33